


Tagtraum

by catbear (bluedreaming)



Category: xxxHoLic
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Post-Canon, Canonical Character Death, Gen, M/M, Mentions of Ichihara Yuuko
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-04
Updated: 2016-07-04
Packaged: 2018-07-20 00:10:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,182
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7383103
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluedreaming/pseuds/catbear
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The longer Watanuki goes without speaking her name, the more he becomes something that's far too much like her, far too little like himself.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tagtraum

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Kisuru](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kisuru/gifts).



> I've always mulled over this particular image, the way Yuuko has such significant presence even after she's no longer there, so I was delighted to be able to explore the characters' interactions in the wake of this.
> 
>  _No one is actually dead until the ripples they cause in the world die away._  
>  —[Terry Pratchett](http://littleatoms.com/words/terry-pratchett-no-one-actually-dead-until-ripples-they-cause-world-die-away)

 

_The woman is perfected._   
_Her dead_

_Body wears the smile of accomplishment,_   
_The illusion of a Greek necessity_

_Flows in the scrolls of her toga,_   
_Her bare_

_Feet seem to be saying:_   
_We have come so far, it is over._

—Sylvia Plath, [Edge](http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poems/detail/49009)

 

Sometimes Watanuki can go for days without speaking her name, his fingers busy tracing the lines of something that's not quite fate through the air. Doumeki watches, fingers curling around the plastic handles of the shopping basket, too much sake. He can picture it leaking between his fingers, seeping, like the bottle of sake in the temple storehouse that he broke accidentally as a child, playing, the fabric of his small yukata tangling beneath his feet.

He hadn't been used to it then, yet.

He's not used to this. Watanuki doesn't speak her name and yet the separate syllables hang, suspended from his fingertips as he drapes his arm over the side of the couch, his sharp lines muffled in the folds of her kimono. It doesn't make any sense, but it feels like the longer Watanuki goes without speaking her name, the more he becomes something that's far too much like her, far too little like himself, for comfort.

"Oy," Doumeki says, letting the plastic shopping bag handles slip through his fingers to land with a clink of glass against glass on the tatami mats of the room. Giggling, Maru and Moro dance forward, nimble fingers clutching at the crinkling plastic as they disappear down the hallway into the kitchen, where Mokona has probably finished the last of the snacks.

Watanuki's eyes are hooded, eyelids fluttering half shut as he watches something Doumeki can't see, but he looks up at Doumeki's sound.

"You can make me shrimp croquettes," he says, instead of the other questions that swirl together in his mouth. He holds his breath, waiting.

 

_花さそふ_   
_あらしの庭の_   
_雪ならで_   
_ふりゆくものは_   
_わが身なりけり_

—西園寺公経, [#96](https://100poets.wordpress.com/2014/02/28/the-scattering-years-of-my-life-poem-96/)

 

Sometimes it's too quiet, in the house. There are so many things to do and Watanuki buries himself in all the small tasks, trying to keep himself from _thinking_ , only to realize that his thoughts have tangled themselves in circles after all. There in the cage, the butterfly is still flapping, Maru and Moro dart along the hallways, the whispers of the house speaking to a mistress who's no longer listening.

His fingers stretch out, tips trailing over the cool surface of the tokkuri, and the sakazuki is full as he lifts it to his lips. Warm brushes his hand, and Mokona's black eyes meet his.

"We could sit on the porch," Watanuki offers, Mokona's bouncing letting him forget for a moment as they sit in the evening breeze and watch the reflection of the full moon dance in the surface of the sake. The burn, as he swallows, is cleansing, and Mokona's off-colour songs are dizzily distracting, but all too soon the tokkuri is empty, the reflection of the moon no longer visible in the empty sakazuki.

His head is too clear, thoughts sharp and precise and Watanuki knows exactly what he's doing when he calls Doumeki at three in the morning to bring more sake when he comes later that day.

"You can make me shrimp croquettes," Doumeki says, standing in the doorway of the room, and Watanuki opens his eyes to meet his gaze.

"Don't tell me what to do," he retorts, frowning, but he can't manage to work up a snit about it and he knows that Doumeki knows that he's glad to see him.

 

_わが袖は_   
_潮干に見えぬ_   
_沖の石の_   
_人こそしらね_   
_かはくまもなし_

—二条院讃岐, [#92](https://100poets.wordpress.com/2014/02/23/even-at-low-tide-poem-92/)

 

A ringtone breaks the stillness, a trickling sound of bells, and Watanuki goes from reclining elegantly on the couch to a mad scramble of limbs and tangled silk as he trips over his feet and bangs his elbow on the side table in his haste to reach the cell phone.

"Hello?" he says, trying to hide his breathlessness, and Doumeki has to laugh, a small twisted knot in his chest unfolding at the image that's so very Watanuki.

 _Ten, nine, eight,_ he counts down in his head, and sure enough Watanuki is hanging up in a whirlwind of activity as he sets the phone down on the table with a clatter and disappears for a moment through the door before emerging in slacks and shirt, sleeves rolled up.

"Get out of the way, giant oaf," he says, elbowing Doumeki as he passes down the hall to the kitchen, but his words are more affectionate than irritated and his arm only brushes the skin of Doumeki's arm like a caress. "Himawari's coming and there's no time!" he calls over his shoulder.

"Don't forget that I want shrimp croquettes," Doumeki says, following along behind, waiting for—

"Make your own croquettes," Watanki huffs, not even bothering to turn around and glare at Doumeki as he pulls the white apron off the hook next to the door and opens the door of the refrigerator. Doumeki watches, the corner of his mouth lifting as he watches Watanuki take out a bag of shrimp, despite his words to the contrary.

 

_I know the bottom, she says. I know it with my great tap root:_   
_It is what you fear._   
_I do not fear it: I have been there._

—Sylvia Plath, [Elm](http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poems/detail/49003)

 

Sometimes, in the middle of the night, Himawari wakes up to the buzzing of her phone on the nightstand next to her head, the screen lighting up with a message that floods the shadowed bedroom with a flicker of light.

"Why don't you just call?" she used to ask, but Doumeki would only ever shrug in response and now she doesn't bother asking anymore. Shaking her head fondly, even as she blinks the sleepy fog out of her head, Himawari reaches for the phone.

you should come to visit again

Doumeki is just as terse via message as in person, but it's not that he has nothing to say. Rather, Himawari has realized over their long acquaintance, Doumeki thinks so much that he can derive a world of meaning from a few words.

 _He's worried about Watanuki_ , she knows.

Himawari calls in the morning, while she's clearing up her few breakfast dishes.

"Hello?" Watanuki sounds slightly out of breath, as though he's emerging from underwater, and she can't help but giggle quietly at the thought, hiding the sound in the brush of the dish sponge in her hand over the porcelain of her rice bowl.

"I have some free time today after class," she says, rinsing the dish in her hands beneath a stream of cool water from the faucet. "Can I come over and visit?"

"Of course!" Watanuki says, pausing for a moment before he continues. "What would you like to eat?" His voice is clearer than before, and she knows that he's entirely there.

"Hmm," Himawari hums. For some reason, the thought of biting into a steaming shrimp croquette swims into her mind and she smiles.

 

_And I_   
_Am the arrow,_

_The dew that flies_   
_Suicidal, at one with the drive_   
_Into the red_

_Eye, the cauldron of morning._

—Sylvia Plath, [Ariel](http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poems/detail/49001)

 

**Author's Note:**

> Note for Kisuru: in your [letter](https://wildfireblossom.dreamwidth.org/8066.html), you nominated four xxxHoLiC characters but you mentioned that it would be okay to write a story that takes place after Yuuko leaves the shop, so I hope that this is okay!


End file.
